Invitations as request-for-service mitigators in academic discourse

Abstract

This study explores the use of invitations as requests for service. The data consist of 246 authentic emailed requests and invitations addressed to faculty members from editors and other institutional entities to solicit reviews of manuscripts, abstracts, and promotion dossiers. These are contrasted with academic invitations to participate in symposia, give talks, contribute chapters, or visit campuses. Four types of evidence, the naming of speech acts, the format of the head acts, the use of components that appear exclusively in requests, and the benefactive status argue that service invitations, in spite of their outward benefactive status, are in fact requests, and that the invitation format is a request-for-service mitigator. For the recipient, the use of invitations enhances the perlocutionary effect (invitations are face boosting) and appears to allow greater freedom of response; for the initiator, the use of invitations in request-for-service contexts allows the sending of reminders to respond (a social expectation for invitations) and permits the withdrawal of the invitation (or disinvitation) in case of non-response.